This article is based on a research project titled- Effective Leadership in Multi-Ethnic Schools: School Community Perspectives and their Leadership Implications. In conducting the study, the author

Dr Howard Stevenson, for its successful completion. For too long, leadership has been researched and written about without taking account cifcontextand societal culture. This article takes as its contextunder-researched multi-ethnic urban schools, and looks at leadership- specifically five successful headteacher case studies- cif these schools. The research project that it reports was carried outfor the National College for School Leadership in the United Kingdom, but the implicationsfrom the study cross nationalboundaries. Thefindings confirm the centrality cifpassionate promulgation cifvalues-driven leadership as the hallmark cif successful leaders cif these schools. Realising that global events and hostilities nowfOr thefirst time penetrate inside schools to effecttheir micro-management, the study suggests that notions cifheadteacher as leader cif local learningcommunities are now obsolete and need replacing with leaders as connected to communities at local, national and global levels. However, the project raised more questions than it answered: we still need to know how leaders conceptualise values such as social justice, inclusion, and equity, and how they put themintopractice.